The Sluggish Bride of the Glorious King

Good evening. Please turn with me in your copies of the Bible to Song of Solomon chapter 5. Song of Solomon chapter 5.

It’s been a while since we were last in this text, so I’ll take a moment to reacquaint us with the story. This book is song, or lyrical poetry, written by Solomon. It contains a story of love, between a woman and her beloved, her shepherd king, her great bridegroom.

The story has taken a lot of twists and turns. We’ve seen them passionately describe their love, and their anticipation of their wedding day. We’ve seen the King tenderly reassure the bride to-be, even when she was fearful, and felt shame about her appearance.

We’ve seen the bride seek diligently throughout the city when her beloved was missing, was nowhere to be found. We’ve seen the Davidic king, in all of his resplendent glory, process into the wedding day with all of his royal glory, using language reminiscent of God leading the people of God out of Egypt and into the promised land.

We’ve also noted that the language that the bride and her beloved use to describe one another is biblically-significant language. They describe each other and their love in the same kind of language and imagery used of the relationship between Yahweh and Israel, which the bible pictures in many places as a marriage covenant. The Lord has wedded himself to his bride, Israel, and that relationship shows up in this book.

At the end of chapter 4 we saw them marching toward their wedding day, and at the end of 4 and beginning of 5, the wedding has finally happened. The bride and groom finally experience the consummation of their union, with all the bliss that comes with it. The king and his bride have finally entered into the promised land, their garden-temple, and can experience the love they’ve so greatly anticipated.

But as we turn into chapter 5, all is not right, as we will soon see. The scene suddenly, and unexpectedly shifts. Let’s read in chapter 5, beginning in verse 2:

² I slept, but my heart was awake.
A sound! My beloved is knocking.
“Open to me, my sister, my love,
my dove, my perfect one,
for my head is wet with dew,
my locks with the drops of the night.”
³ I had put off my garment;
how could I put it on?
I had bathed my feet;
how could I soil them?
⁴ My beloved put his hand to the latch,
and my heart was thrilled within me.
⁵ I arose to open to my beloved,
and my hands dripped with myrrh,
my fingers with liquid myrrh,
on the handles of the bolt.
⁶ I opened to my beloved,
but my beloved had turned and gone.
My soul failed me when he spoke.
I sought him, but found him not;
I called him, but he gave no answer.
⁷ The watchmen found me
as they went about in the city;
they beat me, they bruised me,
they took away my veil,
those watchmen of the walls.
⁸ I adjure you, O daughters of Jerusalem,
if you find my beloved,
that you tell him
I am sick with love.

Let’s look at the first 6 verses and see the King’s Rejection. The King’s Rejection.

Verse 2 begins by setting the scene. The bride is asleep, “but my heart was awake.” People argue over whether or not this sequence of events is meant to be a dream or not, but I’m not sure that really makes a big difference, given the fact that this is poetry. We aren’t reading historical narrative, like the exodus events or the gospels.

We’re reading poetic song, and that impacts how we read things. We’re meant to glean lessons and see connections. It’s meant to move us and shape us, not merely to fill our head with historical facts.

So, the wife is in bed, and she is stirred by a sound of knocking.

“Open to me, my sister, my love, my dove, my perfect one.” At this point, surely, she would know without a doubt who was speaking to her. She’d recognize his voice. She’d know his sweet terms of endearment that he’d used before. In fact, this is the highest concentration in a single verse of this whole book of these kinds of endearing pet names.

This is the king, her husband. His locks of hair are wet with dew. Remember, he’s a shepherd, probably been out at night tending to the flocks.

This is the one that she pined for in preceding chapters, that she scoured the city searching for, the one that made her heart leap. You’d expect her to be elated to see her beloved.

But she isn’t. She gives an unexpected response to his call, verse 3:

³ I had put off my garment;
how could I put it on?
I had bathed my feet;
how could I soil them?

The king comes knocking, comes asking for her company, but she doesn’t immediately jump up. In fact, she does the opposite. She gives excuses why she can’t be bothered.

I’ve already put off my garment, I’m already in my pajamas, I’m already in bed. Perhaps it’s too cold, and she didn’t want to get out from under the covers. She’s already bathed her feet, she’s clean, I don’t want to get dirty again. I’m going to stay in bed.

She’s not willing to be inconvenienced. The once eager and available bride, who pleaded in anticipation just one chapter earlier, “come into my garden and eat of its choicest fruits,” is now instead saying the opposite.

Kitchen’s closed. The Garden is unavailable, off limits.

I wonder if any of this sounds familiar within our own marriages? Your spouse comes knocking, seeking communion, and instead of eagerness and willingness to be available, we come up with excuses?

There are certainly times where we’re exhausted, or where we’re truly unable to muster the strength, but we all need to remember that in healthy marriages there is a mutual willingness to sacrifice for the good of the other. A mutual willingness to serve one another.

I’ve already preached through 1 Corinthians 7 so I won’t belabor the point, but if you’re consistently declining the kind advances of your spouse, then you’re risking putting your marriage under undue temptation from Satan. That’s what Paul says:

“Do not deprive one another, except perhaps by agreement for a limited time, that you may devote yourselves to prayer; but then come together again, so that Satan may not tempt you because of your lack of self-control.”

Marital love ought to be regular. It ought to be the norm. And except for a season of mutual prayer, abstinence ought to be avoided, lest undue temptation come your way.

One old preacher wrote it this way in his commentary on the book of proverbs: “Tender, well-regulated, domestic affection is the best defense against the vagrant desires of unlawful passion.”[1]

Now, lest the burden be place solely on the one being inconvenienced, let’s take a lesson also for the other. What did the king do when his advances were rejected?

He didn’t huff and puff and stomp off pouting.

Nor did he demand his rights. “Don’t you know who I am? I am the king. Nobody tells the king what he can or cannot have. I have the authority to knock down this door.

Don’t you remember what Genesis says, “Adam knew his wife and the two became one flesh”? Or, if we were a bit anachronistic, “don’t you remember what Paul said? Don’t be apart except for prayer”? There better be some serious praying happening in there.”

He didn’t do any of that. He quietly honored her request. He left her alone. He puts her desire to remain in bed above His desire for her to open up.

In fact, he doesn’t just leave her alone, he leaves her with a gift. He left her a present of a sweet-smelling oil called myrrh. Verse 4 says,

⁴ My beloved put his hand to the latch,
and my heart was thrilled within me.
⁵ I arose to open to my beloved,
and my hands dripped with myrrh,
my fingers with liquid myrrh,
on the handles of the bolt.

He left, but not after leaving her a gift. Perhaps he knew that tonight wasn’t going to be the night, but at least I can leave her with a sweet scent for next time. Leave a sweet taste in her mouth, as it were.

There’s no bitterness. No anger. No frustration. No retaliation. Loved ones, when your advances are rebuffed, how do you respond? Are you patient, understanding, willing to sacrifice your own desires for the good of your beloved?

There ought to be a mutual and sacrificial love within a healthy marriage. Seeking to outdo one another in showing honor. And if that is lacking, then ask yourself why? You two both probably need to talk it out. Or if you aren’t in a good place in your marriage, you need to pray to the Lord and probably seek the wisdom of other godly saints.

Marriage ought to be a sweet respite of joy in this life, and if you find it to be the opposite, then please talk to one of us.

But before we leave these few verses, we need to see a few more connections. I believe Solomon is hinting at something more than human marriage. I think he’s also using this poetry to teach us lessons regarding Israel, and her marriage covenant to the Lord.

If you will recall, when God brought the Hebrews out of slavery in Egypt, he took her to Mount Sinai and made a covenant with her. He married himself to Israel. And they hadn’t even made it off of the mountain yet before Israel committed adultery. Moses hadn’t yet come down from the Mountain, and Aaron and the people had crafted a golden calf, and said “Here is your god that brought you out of Egypt.”

And if you can remember a few weeks back, and I’m building off of Jim Hamilton’s comments in his really helpful commentary on this book, in Song of Solomon 3, Solomon presents the king in “terms that remind his audience of the Lord coming out of Egypt…And then the bride is spoken of as though she is the promised land and the garden of Eden in 4:1-15. The consummation of the [marriage] relationship is described as though the King has entered the Garden of Eden to enjoy all its beauty and bounty in 4:16-5:1.

Just as Israel entered the covenant and immediately turned away from the Lord [on Sinai], in this passage that immediately follows the consummation of the wedding, the bride rejects the King, who will withdraw, and then the bride will be disciplined, after which she will seek the king.”[2]

Let me say that another way. I think that Solomon is painting a picture here that corresponds with the history if Israel, and how Yahweh’s bride has treated her king. Israel was unfaithful, unwilling to commune with the Lord, unwilling to honor him and his law, and that led to all sorts of problems, which we will get to in a minute.

But let’s not rush past a personal application here too. Some of you have been married to the Lord for a long time. You’ve trusted in the Davidic king, Jesus Christ, and united to him as your bridegroom. And yet, your love has grown cold. Your faith feels stale. You used to be like the woman in verse 4, with your heart thrilled by the king, but now, not so much.

There is a lesson here for you too. There is a way to grow sluggish in our faith. Apathetic. Lukewarm. Indifferent to the things of God. If that’s you, then I want you to be warned. You’re in a dangerous place. God speaks to this condition later in the bible, in Revelation 3, a text that I think specifically references our passage in Song of Solomon 5.

In Revelation 3, Christ speaks to the church of Laodicea, and he gives them a firm rebuke. He says to them

¹⁵ “‘I know your works: you are neither cold nor hot. Would that you were either cold or hot! ¹⁶ So, because you are lukewarm, and neither hot nor cold, I will spit you out of my mouth. ¹⁹ Those whom I love, I reprove and discipline, so be zealous and repent.

If we remain in a position of indifference to God, of apathy towards him, if we never turn back to him, we’re tempting him to discipline us. A faithful father disciplines the Son whom he loves, and he loves us enough not to leave us in our coldness.

One old pastor said it this way: Those whom the king loves he will not leave alone in their carelessness, but will find some way or another to awaken them, to rebuke them, or chasten them. When we are unmindful of Christ, he thinks of us, and provides for us that our faith will not fail.[3]

In fact, the very next verse in Revelation 3:20, leaves us with a promise:

²⁰ Behold, I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears my voice and opens the door, I will come in to him.”

Christ’s promise to his people is that whatever our indifference, whatever our lack of faith, whatever our apathy, whatever our lukewarm-ness, he’s always ready to receive us. Even though we’re like the woman in the text that can’t be bothered to get out of bed for the king, Christ is the faithful Davidic son, the King greater than Solomon.

And just like the king leaves a bit of grace, a little myrrh on the door handle, so too has Christ left for you a bit of grace to warm your heart again. This sermon is a bit of myrrh to wake you from your stupor and help you see yourself and your king rightly.

Don’t reject the calls of your king. Don’t forget his sacrifice in your place. That he was the one rejected by his own people, that he was the one suffering alone and exposed.

Unlike the king in verse 3 who’s locks are wet with dew from the night, Christ stood alone in the garden sweating drops of blood. He knew agony, he knew the feeling of being alone. He knew what rejection feels like. He was despised and rejected by men, scripture say.

And he did all that so that his bride, who HAD rejected him, could be made acceptable and lovely again. He was treated like a criminal, so that a harlot of a bride might be made pure again. That’s the good news of scripture, and I hope that good news will warm your heart. I hope that news will be a pleasant aroma, like myrrh in your nostrils.

No matter how far you’ve wandered, no matter how many times you’ve rejected him, he calls you back. He stands at the door and knocks. Will you embrace him? Will you trust in him? I hope you will.

Because if you don’t, you are putting yourself in a position to suffer misery, just like Israel did. You tempt God to discipline you. Which is what happens next in our text. Let’s look at verses 6 & 7 and see the bride’s discipline. The Bride’s discipline.

⁶ I opened to my beloved,
but my beloved had turned and gone.
My soul failed me when he spoke.
I sought him, but found him not;
I called him, but he gave no answer.

The bride has changed her mind. Now she wants to let the king in. She gets out of bed and opens the door, but he’s gone. He’s nowhere to be seen. She looks all around, but can’t find him. She calls out for him, but hears nothing.

It is a similar scene from chapter 3, where she likewise is having a dream and can’t find her beloved. Panic sets in. But unlike chapter 3, this time the feeling is probably even worse, because she undoubtedly feels a sense of guilt. He was here, and I wouldn’t let him in. And now he is gone. Guilt mixed with fear is probably creeping in.

So she runs out, seeking him. And then we get to verse 7, which is honestly one of the more puzzling parts of this entire book. Look at verse 7:

⁷ The watchmen found me
as they went about in the city;
they beat me, they bruised me,
they took away my veil,
those watchmen of the walls.

So she’s running around the city looking for her king. She runs upon the night watchmen who’s job was to patrol the city looking for problematic characters. And the watchmen–probably mistaking her for a, um, woman of ill-repute, because that’s ordinarily the only kind of women you’d find roaming the street at night—the watchmen find her and beat her, they bruise her.

They take away her veil, or we might translate it her cloak. What does all that mean? I want to be careful here. I don’t want to insinuate that if a women rejects her husband’s advances that she will end up getting beat up. That won’t do at all.

And we need to remember that this is a dream-like sequence of poetry. It’s not historical narrative, or a record of factual events that happened in Solomon’s day. It’s fiction. So what conclusions ought we draw from the episode with the watchmen?

As I’ve studied this text and read what other people think about it, I’ll give you a few options, and let you know where I’m leaning.

Some commentators, especially the older ones, take the watchmen to be representing poor ministers of the gospel. The title of “watchmen” is used elsewhere in scripture to refer to the spiritual leaders of Israel, and if that is case, they reckon, then here the watchmen might picture for us unskilled or uncareful ministers of God’s word who wrongly read the situation.

It is certainly possible that this reference to the watchmen is the false prophets who mislead and mistreat the faithful during their day.

In our story, the watchmen think she is a harlot running around and plying her trade in the middle of the night, rather than recognizing her as the Queen, the wife of the king.

Advocates of this view might reference other times where godly saints are mistaken for sinners, like when Hannah is pouring out her soul to the Lord in prayer, and Eli, the lead minister or watchman in Israel during that time, rebukes her for being drunk.

This view, of the watchmen as poor ministers or leaders, was suggested by guys like Matthew Henry and John Gill. I think this view is possible, but I’m not sure that’s all that’s going on in this text.

A second view, advocated by modern guys like Tremper Longman, say that the watchmen represents the unfriendly gaze of the public eye. He says specifically, the treatment by the watchmen represents “the unfriendly urban-public gaze versus the private intimacies of the couple.”^[4] He offers little by way of defense of his assertion, and leaves me with little to commend of his view.

A third view, that I lean toward, is that the episode of the watchmen is a parable of the dangers of rejecting the king. Specifically, I think this is a lesson for us from Solomon, referencing the national fate of Israel, as well as the personal spiritual danger of rejecting the king.

Solomon is writing this during his reign, and the people of God are still in the land of promise. But he knew the bible. He knew what Moses had written. Moses wrote in Leviticus 26, and Deuteronomy 4, and Deuteronomy 28-32 that Israel would break the covenant. And that that rejection would earn the discipline of the Lord, and they would be exiled from the Land. Solomon knew that discipline and exile from the land had been prophesied for God’s people.

In fact, turn with me for a moment to 1 Kings chapter 8. I Kings chapter 8. Here Solomon is Praying a magnificent prayer at the dedication of the temple of God.

⁴⁶ “If they sin against you—for there is no one who does not sin—and you are angry with them and give them to an enemy, so that they are carried away captive to the land of the enemy, far off or near, ⁴⁷ yet if they turn their heart in the land to which they have been carried captive, and repent and plead with you in the land of their captors, saying, ‘We have sinned and have acted perversely and wickedly,’ ⁴⁸ if they repent with all their heart and with all their soul in the land of their enemies, who carried them captive, and pray to you toward their land, which you gave to their fathers, the city that you have chosen, and the house that I have built for your name, ⁴⁹ then hear in heaven your dwelling place their prayer and their plea, and maintain their cause ⁵⁰ and forgive your people who have sinned against you, and all their transgressions that they have committed against you, and grant them compassion in the sight of those who carried them captive, that they may have compassion on them ⁵¹ (for they are your people, and your heritage, which you brought out of Egypt, from the midst of the iron furnace). ⁵² Let your eyes be open to the plea of your servant and to the plea of your people Israel, giving ear to them whenever they call to you. ⁵³ For you separated them from among all the peoples of the earth to be your heritage, as you declared through Moses your servant, when you brought our fathers out of Egypt, O Lord God.”

Solomon knew, even in the midst of present peace and prosperity under his reign, He knew that exile, that discipline, was in the cards for the nation. Things are going great now, but it won’t be that way forever. And when that day comes that they sin against you, and they earn discipline for themselves and get carried off, and then they repent and pray, hear their prayers. That’s what Solomon prays.

Going back to Song of Solomon 5, I think that the episode with the watchmen is a parable about the nation of Israel. A warning. She rejects her king, he departs, just like the glory departed the nation, and then she endures suffering.

But I think there is a warning there for us, as I mentioned above. When we reject the king, ignore his presence, ignore communion with him, then we accrue for ourselves discipline. It may be felt in all sorts of ways. Sometimes we are left without a sense his presence and we feel alone.

He doesn’t actually leave his people, but he can withdraw the comforting sense, the feeling sense of his presence, so that we feel alone, bereft of our beloved. And this is his loving discipline to bring us back to Him.

Sometimes he takes us through physical suffering to wake us up and bring us back to him.

Sometimes it is financial hardship, to teach us what really matters.

Sometimes it is relational strife, to remind us of who is actually our savior.

Whatever the discipline, when we reject the king, he loves us enough to wake us from our slumber and bring us back to himself.

And as we being to close, I want to make one final observation. Sometimes when we go through God’s discipline, we can be tempted in all sorts of ways. We can despair. We can wallow in self-pity: “nobody knows the trouble I’ve seen. Nobody knows my sorrow.”

We can grow bitter toward God. How could he possibly do this to me? All I do is sacrifice to him. I’m faithful. How can God be so unjust to me.

Or we can even grow jealous. We feel our suffering, we feel bruised and beaten like the woman in the text, and we look at the guy next to us who’s life seems to be going so well, and we covet their situation.

Have you ever felt that way when you are suffering under the rod of the Lord’s discipline?

But notice verse 8: How does the bride respond to discipline:

⁸ I adjure you, O daughters of Jerusalem,
if you find my beloved,
that you tell him
I am sick with love.

Notice what she doesn’t say: If you find my beloved, tell him I’ve been beaten. I’ve been mistreated. I’ve been robbed of my cloak or my veil. I’ve been bruised.

No. She says, “tell him I am sick with love.” She’s not the least bit concerned with the discipline or the trial she is going through. The worst part of her experience is that she’s bereft of her king, and she’s sick with love.

Discipline in a believer’s life ought to be this way. A faithful believer going through trial is able to say through the whole of it: God is righteous. Everything the Lord does is just. And they are able do endure under it. They know that the worst part of any trial is not the physical suffering, but the absence of communion the king.

Believers, especially those going through a trial or if you feel under the discipling hand of the Lord, don’t fixate on the burden, or the suffering. Don’t let it crush you or make you bitter. See beyond it. Look behind it.

For the rod of God’s discipline is held in his very hand, and his hands are full of goodness and love toward you. He’s not wrathful toward you. He doesn’t hate you. He’s not punishing you for what you’ve done. That was all taken away on the cross. God has no more wrath for you. If he did, he would be unjust!

No, he’s loving you, molding you, shaping you, weening you from the love of this world, and pushing your heart toward it’s eternal good.

[1] C. Bridges, An Exposition of the Book of Proverbs, 3rd ed. (London: Seeleys, 1850), 1:83.

[2] Jim Hamilton, Song of Songs (Christian Focus: Fearn, 2015), 100.

[3] Adapted from Matthew Henry’s commentary on Song of Solomon 5:2.

^[4] Tremper Longman, Song of Songs, The New International Commentary on the Old Testament (Grand Rapids, MI: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Co., 2001), 169.